I Don't Want Limited Goods
by Darkrealmist v.2
Summary: Hikari Netto would rather be doing anything else than chaperoning Sakurai Meiru's shopping extravaganza, even if it means going on another hunt for three trouble-prone NetNavi children with his friend, Hikawa Tohru. [Animeverse. Netto & Tohru friendship. No slash]


I Don't Want Limited Goods

Author's Note: An alternate take on the events of episode 19 of _Beast+_. Shout-out to Kam's Café, where I was holed up while brainstorming this. Enjoy the story and R&R.

Disclaimer: I do not own anything related to or of the Rockman EXE series.

Summary:

Hikari Netto would rather be doing anything else than chaperoning Sakurai Meiru's shopping extravaganza, even if it means going on another hunt for three trouble-prone NetNavi children with his friend, Hikawa Tohru.

* * *

On a lonely street, with the acrimonious heat of the unclouded sun bearing down on him, a tired Hikari Netto was poring over a vending machine, considering its numerous and motley wares. He inserted a coin, inputted his selection, and obtained the can of lime juice he hankered for from the beverage station's delivery tray.

"I want to go home!" he heaved, popping the drink's lid.

"You can't do that, Netto-kun," Rockman's hologram badgered.

"You don't have to tell me!"

He didn't understand what was so special about this limited-edition handbag people were going crazy for. Was it the posters around town hawking it as "the must-have brand-name bag for every heroine" that appealed to women? Because the women in his life sure had it bad. Meiru-chan had invited herself into his house bright and early, shaken him awake, and forced him to come along with her to stand in line at the store. Mama had sallied forth sooner that morning, and both Manabe-san and Madoi-san had expressed interest on separate occasions at the beginning of the week. It was bananas. A miracle he even slipped away for an instant to breathe.

He was about to quench his thirst when a friend approached him, concern plastered across his visage.

"Netto-kun, do you know where Iceman is?" Hikawa Tohru asked.

"No, why?"

"I lost contact with him an hour ago. He and Aquaman went fishing in Internet City, and we decided to touch base at Higureya, but neither of them returned. Shuuko-san is really worried about Aquaman, too."

"Hmm…" Netto deliberated the sticky wicket, realizing how solving the quandary could be mutually beneficial for the two of them. "I'll help you look for them!"

"Is that okay? You're not busy?"

Netto rubbed the back of his head. "If you call being shouted at by Meiru-chan busy."

Tohru whispered condolences.

Just then, a trio of substantialized plushie-sized NetNavis blitzed past them, screaming and wildly swinging their arms. At the front of the band was the rotund Darkloid, Bubbleman, and nipping at his flippered heels were Iceman and Aquaman. A deranged yellow-bowed Ameropan terrier with lopped tongue was in hot pursuit.

"Run away, puku!"

"AHH! What is that?" Iceman yelled.

"I have no idea, puku! It's been chasing me since before, puku!"

"Pyurururururu!" Aquaman cried, the sprinkler on his fishbowl helmet spurting water.

Netto and Tohru confusedly observed the children making their escape, the rabid purse dog barking up a storm inches shy of their tushies.

"Well, there they are," Netto purveyed the readily apparent. "Should we follow them?"

Tohru, however, was already hurrying off.

"Oi, wait up, Tohru-kun!"

By the time the sixth-graders caught up, the Navis had somehow weaseled their patooties into another pickle. Between blocks, they eluded their canine oppressor, only to attract the undesired attention of a pair of high-schoolers. Mistaken for dolls, they found themselves several newly purchased cardigans and dresses deep in shopping totes among other female effects. Patently obvious no one had ever lectured the girls on the evils of shoplifting.

"Excuse me!" Tohru stopped them outside the florist's, ignoring a despondent Bubbleman, who they left unadopted at the doorstep on account of him not being cute like Iceman and Aquaman. "Those are not toys!"

Netto hunched over his knees, panting. Man, Tohru was fast when he needed to be.

One of the unintentional kidnappers dangled Iceman by a leg from her belongings, his birthmarked posterior to the sky. "This?"

"He's my Navi."

"Oh, Tohru-kun! I-I'm saved, desu!" the woozy little Eskimo cheered.

Aquaman's indistinct, vaguely allayed gurgling arose from the second maiden's bargain goods.

Once they had cleared things up with the lasses and sent Bubbleman on his way, the boys retired to the playground in a nearby park to recuperate, sitting lodged in playpen windows. In the madcap dash to gain ground, Netto had forfeited his juice to the sidewalk, but Tohru obliged a replacement can, and bought himself a bottle of Ramune while he was at it.

"How are you in the real world?" Tohru pinched Iceman's baby face, and was surprised his Navi reacted to the stimulus. It was solid, flexible metal. Not true tissue.

"Thanks to these amazing Miniroids, pyu!" the skirted Aquaman answered in his stead.

"That charts," Netto said, guzzling sugary revitalizing tonic.

Refusing to forsake his Darkloid roots and align with his fellow Aqua Navis in the light, Bubbleman led a destitute lifestyle, abetting random ruckuses here and there. His allegiances were as fluid as his elemental strong suit. Evidently, he'd started selling the diminutive robots to humans out of his bindle to make ends meet.

"What was Bubbleman after?"

"We were looking for something!" Aquaman chippered.

"What exactly?"

"Pyurururururu." The offensively adorable Navi thought hard to remember. "A bag! If we found it, Bubbleman promised us DVDs, pyu!"

Of course. That accursed handbag! And Bubbleman memorabilia?

Netto keeled over. "I don't get it."

"Iceman, explain yourself," Tohru ordered.

"Anyhow, we were having great fun until that slobber monster showed up, desu!"

Likewise stumped, Tohru joined Netto at the bottom of the sandbox. "I don't get it either."

"Netto-kun, aren't you forgetting something?" Rockman spoke up.

Puzzled, the brunette stewed over the Blue Bomber's rebuke, then shot up in panic. "Rats! I forgot! Meiru-chan!"

At the store, the vendors finally fixed the cash register Bubbleman accidentally smashed with his tuchus, and were ringing up Meiru's much dreamed about investment. Her trophy was in reach, its pink ribbon and wicker workmanship filling her with a profound sense of accomplishment. But the classmate she brought to this shindig, who told her he required juice and would come right back, was nowhere in sight. Who was she supposed to flaunt her designer accessory to now?

"Netto, that creep!"


End file.
